Isn't it Proud to Want to Be Like God?
It occurred to me today that the New Testament is all about being like God. It begins with Jesus who is the exact image of God and it moves on to tell us that through His atoning death for our sins, burial, and resurrection from the dead, we can be born again and receive His Spirit, which means we can become the sons of God and walk even as He walked.
This is absolutely tremendous, but I thought about it from a slightly different angle today. Jesus taught His disciples to be perfect and that means going beyond what is 'just enough' to what is full and overflowing. It may be 'just enough' to greet those who are your friends and like-minded, but it is full and overflowing to greet those who are outsiders and differ, as well. He gives a number of examples to illustrate this but at the heart of His message is that we should be like this because our Father in heaven is like this. We are truly His children if we walk in likeness to Him.
But the scandal of it occurred to me today, and the scandal continues to this present day. Jesus says, "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfect." (Matt 5:48)
How can a man have the ambition of being like God at all? Would not even the desire to be like God be a manifestation of great pride? Isn't this what is said of the fall of Lucifer, that he was proud and wanted to be like the Most High (Isaiah 14:14)?
But the answer is found in who you think God is. It is only pride to want to be like God if you believe God is proud. If you believe God is humble in heart then to want to be like God in His integral nature (Mark 12:29) is not apart from willingness to be made humble in heart, which is worthy.
I can't help thinking about Islam and Muhammad and how he rejected the Gospel, at the centre of which is Christ's humble willingness as a man to assume the role of a servant even to the point of death on a cross. Muhammad rejected the Scriptures that say Jesus is the image of the invisible God (2 Cor 4:4, Col 1:15, Heb 1:3) and so he could not see that the humility of Jesus reveals the humility of God the Father. So Muhammad had a god that was unknowable because that is the only alternative to a God who is willing to reveal Himself to His creatures and enable them to become like Him. The god of Muhammad jealously guards his nature for himself. This is the picture of a god who sits atop a pyramid like a tyrant. No one can be like him and it would be deserving of condemnation even to try. Muhammad is believed to have said that not one iota of pride would be able to enter paradise, but the only coherent reason for this in Islam must be that the only one permitted to be proud is Muhammad's god...and Muhammad is his prophet.
Furthermore, Muhammad could not understand why God would allow His holy prophet Jesus to suffer and die on a cross, being put there by evil men, notwithstanding Jesus' saying that, "No man taketh it (my life) from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and power to take it again. This commandment have I received from my Father" (John 10:18). Muhammad did not understand this. He thought that God would never allow sinners to crucify a sinless prophet! And yet in Jesus' submission to God's will in laying down His life (and taking it again), Jesus exemplifies the meaning of the word Islam: submission. The greatest example of Islam in history is given by Jesus, and Muhammad could not understand it and so denied it. The judgment is incredible. In the preceding verse, Jesus says that His Father loves Him for the reason that He lays down His life, that He might take it again. Jesus' Father loves Him because He is willing to suffer even death on a cross in order to be the Saviour of the world, in obedience to His Father's will. God loves Jesus because He was willing to humble Himself, and Jesus is the image of God.
By the cross, therefore, the humility of God is revealed, and thus to receive Jesus by faith and to walk even as He walked is to walk in humility. To be made like God by the work of the Holy Spirit within the believer is a journey where all progress is made in steps of humbleness of heart. Jesus never changes (Heb 13:8), so even when He ascended up far above all heavens (Eph 4:10), He did not cease to be humble. Humility of heart is not a garment He threw away when He sat down with His Father on His throne. We know this because the Scripture says that the LORD has respect unto the lowly.
"Though the LORD be high, yet hath he respect unto the lowly: but the proud he knoweth afar off." Psalm 138:6
Lucifer may well have fallen because of pride but it is not because he wanted to be like God but because he coveted God's position but not God Himself. Comparing the verse above with Isaiah 14:14, Lucifer wanted to be like God in His highness but not like God in having respect unto the lowly. Instead of glory, which proceeds from Who God Is, Lucifer would put pride, which is self-absorbed and self-destructive (Prov 16:18, Dan 5:20-21). He wanted to replace God with himself, not replace himself with God.
It is the opposite of what John the Baptist said. This man expressed humility when he said of himself that he was not worthy to stoop down and unloose the latchet of the Messiah's shoe (Mark 1:7). And he said of Jesus, He must increase, but I decrease (John 3:30). And of the man who gave this example, Jesus said, "Among those that are born of women there is not a greater prophet than John the Baptist: but he that is least in the kingdom of God is greater than he." Luke 7:28
In this discussion of humility, we must be alert when seeing words like 'greater' and 'least' to consider what they really mean. John the Baptist, as a man born of woman, spoke humbly of himself. And so Jesus exalted him (1 Peter 5:6). But when the Lord said, "He that is least in the kingdom of God is greater than he", it means that the most humble in the kingdom of God is more highly exalted than John the Baptist. Spiritually interpreted for Christians, it means that the faithful man finds the expression of the nature and character of Jesus Christ enlarged and increasing in his life and the expression of his own flesh diminished and decreasing. The most humble is the one in whom Jesus Christ has become great in their lives and who has become smallest in themselves. The Apostle Paul is our example, and this is what he meant when he said he is less than the least of all saints (Eph 2:8). He did not mean he is the worst of all saints but that because of his calling, Christ became great in him and he became less than the least of all saints (Eph 3:8).
"I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me." Gal 2:20
Surely these are the very words of one who is greater than John the Baptist, and this is our example of faith to follow. So in conclusion, there are two answers to the question posed in the title of today's blog. One, it is not proud to want to be like God in His whole or integral nature because God Himself is not proud. He is glorious. Pride is a deviant counterfeit of glory. And second, the manner in which a Christian becomes like God is by the expression of Christ in the person's life instead of the expression of his own flesh, and this is accomplished through faith in Christ. Thus a Christian is translated from darkness to light by the new birth and transformed by the effect of being filled with the Spirit (Titus 3:5), and thus in no sense becomes a usurper of the divine nature but a partaker (1 Cor 12:13, 2 Peter 1:3-4). The conclusion of this process is something we shall come to together as believers and so we see has not happened yet: to comprehend what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; and to know the love of Christ, which passes knowledge, that we together might be filled with all the fulness of God (Eph 3:18-19, 4:13)!
This is absolutely tremendous, but I thought about it from a slightly different angle today. Jesus taught His disciples to be perfect and that means going beyond what is 'just enough' to what is full and overflowing. It may be 'just enough' to greet those who are your friends and like-minded, but it is full and overflowing to greet those who are outsiders and differ, as well. He gives a number of examples to illustrate this but at the heart of His message is that we should be like this because our Father in heaven is like this. We are truly His children if we walk in likeness to Him.
But the scandal of it occurred to me today, and the scandal continues to this present day. Jesus says, "Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father in heaven is perfect." (Matt 5:48)
How can a man have the ambition of being like God at all? Would not even the desire to be like God be a manifestation of great pride? Isn't this what is said of the fall of Lucifer, that he was proud and wanted to be like the Most High (Isaiah 14:14)?
But the answer is found in who you think God is. It is only pride to want to be like God if you believe God is proud. If you believe God is humble in heart then to want to be like God in His integral nature (Mark 12:29) is not apart from willingness to be made humble in heart, which is worthy.
I can't help thinking about Islam and Muhammad and how he rejected the Gospel, at the centre of which is Christ's humble willingness as a man to assume the role of a servant even to the point of death on a cross. Muhammad rejected the Scriptures that say Jesus is the image of the invisible God (2 Cor 4:4, Col 1:15, Heb 1:3) and so he could not see that the humility of Jesus reveals the humility of God the Father. So Muhammad had a god that was unknowable because that is the only alternative to a God who is willing to reveal Himself to His creatures and enable them to become like Him. The god of Muhammad jealously guards his nature for himself. This is the picture of a god who sits atop a pyramid like a tyrant. No one can be like him and it would be deserving of condemnation even to try. Muhammad is believed to have said that not one iota of pride would be able to enter paradise, but the only coherent reason for this in Islam must be that the only one permitted to be proud is Muhammad's god...and Muhammad is his prophet.
Furthermore, Muhammad could not understand why God would allow His holy prophet Jesus to suffer and die on a cross, being put there by evil men, notwithstanding Jesus' saying that, "No man taketh it (my life) from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and power to take it again. This commandment have I received from my Father" (John 10:18). Muhammad did not understand this. He thought that God would never allow sinners to crucify a sinless prophet! And yet in Jesus' submission to God's will in laying down His life (and taking it again), Jesus exemplifies the meaning of the word Islam: submission. The greatest example of Islam in history is given by Jesus, and Muhammad could not understand it and so denied it. The judgment is incredible. In the preceding verse, Jesus says that His Father loves Him for the reason that He lays down His life, that He might take it again. Jesus' Father loves Him because He is willing to suffer even death on a cross in order to be the Saviour of the world, in obedience to His Father's will. God loves Jesus because He was willing to humble Himself, and Jesus is the image of God.
By the cross, therefore, the humility of God is revealed, and thus to receive Jesus by faith and to walk even as He walked is to walk in humility. To be made like God by the work of the Holy Spirit within the believer is a journey where all progress is made in steps of humbleness of heart. Jesus never changes (Heb 13:8), so even when He ascended up far above all heavens (Eph 4:10), He did not cease to be humble. Humility of heart is not a garment He threw away when He sat down with His Father on His throne. We know this because the Scripture says that the LORD has respect unto the lowly.
"Though the LORD be high, yet hath he respect unto the lowly: but the proud he knoweth afar off." Psalm 138:6
Lucifer may well have fallen because of pride but it is not because he wanted to be like God but because he coveted God's position but not God Himself. Comparing the verse above with Isaiah 14:14, Lucifer wanted to be like God in His highness but not like God in having respect unto the lowly. Instead of glory, which proceeds from Who God Is, Lucifer would put pride, which is self-absorbed and self-destructive (Prov 16:18, Dan 5:20-21). He wanted to replace God with himself, not replace himself with God.
It is the opposite of what John the Baptist said. This man expressed humility when he said of himself that he was not worthy to stoop down and unloose the latchet of the Messiah's shoe (Mark 1:7). And he said of Jesus, He must increase, but I decrease (John 3:30). And of the man who gave this example, Jesus said, "Among those that are born of women there is not a greater prophet than John the Baptist: but he that is least in the kingdom of God is greater than he." Luke 7:28
In this discussion of humility, we must be alert when seeing words like 'greater' and 'least' to consider what they really mean. John the Baptist, as a man born of woman, spoke humbly of himself. And so Jesus exalted him (1 Peter 5:6). But when the Lord said, "He that is least in the kingdom of God is greater than he", it means that the most humble in the kingdom of God is more highly exalted than John the Baptist. Spiritually interpreted for Christians, it means that the faithful man finds the expression of the nature and character of Jesus Christ enlarged and increasing in his life and the expression of his own flesh diminished and decreasing. The most humble is the one in whom Jesus Christ has become great in their lives and who has become smallest in themselves. The Apostle Paul is our example, and this is what he meant when he said he is less than the least of all saints (Eph 2:8). He did not mean he is the worst of all saints but that because of his calling, Christ became great in him and he became less than the least of all saints (Eph 3:8).
"I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me." Gal 2:20
Surely these are the very words of one who is greater than John the Baptist, and this is our example of faith to follow. So in conclusion, there are two answers to the question posed in the title of today's blog. One, it is not proud to want to be like God in His whole or integral nature because God Himself is not proud. He is glorious. Pride is a deviant counterfeit of glory. And second, the manner in which a Christian becomes like God is by the expression of Christ in the person's life instead of the expression of his own flesh, and this is accomplished through faith in Christ. Thus a Christian is translated from darkness to light by the new birth and transformed by the effect of being filled with the Spirit (Titus 3:5), and thus in no sense becomes a usurper of the divine nature but a partaker (1 Cor 12:13, 2 Peter 1:3-4). The conclusion of this process is something we shall come to together as believers and so we see has not happened yet: to comprehend what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; and to know the love of Christ, which passes knowledge, that we together might be filled with all the fulness of God (Eph 3:18-19, 4:13)!
